Results date announced for Leaving Cert 2023

The 2023 Leaving Certificate and Leaving Certificate Applied examination results will released to candidates on Friday 25 August, the State Examinations Commission (SEC) has announced.

This is a full week earlier than the 2022 results date. This follows extensive work by the SEC to improve the timeline by taking account of all of the factors which feed into the process and ensuring adequate time for extensive checks and balances.

The announcement was made following a previous announcement by by Minister for Education Norma Foley of the adjustments to the assessment arrangements for students taking examinations in 2023, who also announced there would be no ‘cliff edge’ or automatic return to pre-pandemic grade profiles for Leaving Certificate results this year.

The SEC has also been engaged in the planning and delivery of all aspects of the examinations across Leaving Certificate, Leaving Certificate Applied and Junior Cycle examination programmes.

Some 134,800 candidates are entered to take the certificate examinations this year, an increase of almost 2.6% (+3400) compared to last year, which was the first time a full set of examinations were run since 2019.

Of the total, 60,200 are entered to sit the Leaving Certificate Established examinations while 3,800 are entered to sit the Leaving Certificate Applied examinations.

Similar to 2022, there are a number of significant factors which have made providing a date for the issue of the Leaving Certificate results difficult until now. There will again be a series of deferred examinations for candidates who miss their examinations in the main sitting due to close family bereavement or serious illness, accident or injury.

The SEC has set out to address shortages in the numbers of teachers undertaking roles with the SEC, especially to mark the written examinations, through a whole-of-system review, in which all of the education partners were included. Arising from this process which has included a revitalised recruitment campaign, enhanced rates of payment, and very active support from teacher unions, school leadership and management bodies, the number of written examiners is at a higher level than at this time in 2022.

The commitment to avoid a “cliff-edge” in the profile of results is likely to require an adjustment to the marks awarded to students through the marking process which can only be applied once all of the marking has been completed. This step will add time to the results process in comparison to a normal (pre-Covid) year.

Results will issue to candidates through the Candidate Self Service Portal available at www.examinations.ie and on www.gov.ie/leavingcertificate. The SEC will be issuing a direct communication to candidates by email about the planned date for issue of the Leaving Certificate results and about the arrangements for their examinations more generally.